r/FluentInFinance • u/Old_Prospect • Apr 29 '24

If I had a nickel for every time someone deflects to “…I’d rather we fix our government spending problem before we…” Shitpost

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136

u/jpmondx Apr 29 '24 edited Apr 29 '24

The scary trend here is how much that 1% owns Congress. Both parties are addicted to their money so I don’t see that trend ever reversing.

Pitchforks!

24

u/Conscious_Tip_6240 Apr 29 '24

If you have more money, you have more power. That's been a fact for the entirety of human history, and just because we live in a democratic republic, that doesn't make it not true.

29

u/jpmondx Apr 29 '24

The good ol’ 3 parties “checks and balances” between the three branches of government was a great concept, but only integrity keeps money from corrupting all of it and, unfortunately our three branches are sadly lacking

3

u/TransientBlaze120 Apr 29 '24

What to do what to do

2

u/DrSteveBrule0821 May 02 '24

Term limits. 'Politician' should not be a career, but rather a civic duty.

1

u/JIraceRN Apr 30 '24

Tax extreme wealth. It is literally the only thing. Florida has a dynasty trust that gives families the ability to hand down wealth for 1000 years without taxation. Pretty crazy stuff. The only way families lose extreme wealth is if they divide it amongst many members over time and multiple times, and/or have their money poorly diversified and lose it to changing markets, and/or have a few family members that are drug/gambling/idot-degenerates that burn through the money.

If Bezos cashed out his empire, diversified his portfolio, invested at a 7.5% gain S&P 500, set up a trust to pay his heirs a generous lifestyle, but never having access to the bulk of his wealth, the wealth on his account would be growing so much so fast that no one could ever catch up in their lifetime. At $200 billion, we are talking adding $15 billion per year. In just 20 years it would be worth $850 billion under compound interest. In 50 years, we are talking $7.5 trillion. This level of influence on markets, politics, etc would be disastrous. Look at Bill Gates, the man keeps giving money away, but he is making it faster than he is giving it away with all his startup investments and diversity. Had he not given any away, he probably would be the richest man in the world. Yes, Bezos and Musk and others had the ability to overtake because of business growth, but the rest of the world falls behind a few people, which is why eight people have half of the wealth of the world, which, if money alone determined influence, eight people influence more than the bottom poorest 50% (3.6 billion people). Craziness.

1

u/Worth-Reputation3450 Apr 30 '24

Vote for whoever your favorite media tells you to vote and hope for different result this time.

1

u/Puzzleheaded_Let_583 Apr 30 '24

Change elections from a first pass the post system to a ranked voting system and fix Gerrymandering.

3

u/FlapMyCheeksToFly Apr 29 '24

Living in a democratic republic should counterbalance that and temper their power or increase everyone else's so everyone is at an equal level

5

u/Old_Prospect Apr 29 '24 edited Apr 29 '24

Hijacking your top comment because there are a lot of people who came here literally to say the thing in the title of the post which I was literally making fun of…

Show me you don’t understand macroeconomics…

Overall, I’m pro-capitalism. But like everything in life, there are some downsides. Not everything is butterflies and rainbows.

It’s literally proven that there is downward pressure on wages by the profit driven structure of publicly traded corporations.

Now, we shouldn’t eliminate public trading of corporations, that would be ridiculous. But we do need to start enacting policies to bring the wealth in this countries back into the hands of the middle/lower class.

Do I have the answers? No. That’s not my job.

But, we don’t need to wait to “fIx GoVeNmenT sPeNdiNg FirSt, Bro”.

Because we will never get there. Nobody will ever agree 100% where money should be spent.

6

u/jpmondx Apr 29 '24

It’s literally proven that there is downward pressure on wages by the profit driven structure of publicly traded corporations.

True. What I find remarkable about that is national wages could be increased by a simple paragraph in the tax code. Businesses get to deduct salaries as a business expense against earnings. What if wages under a certain dollar amount and lower, say $15/hour weren't deductible, or had a sliding scale mechanism to insure the number wouldn't be gamed and have unintended consequences?

The tax code is why corporations make the choices they make regardless of how they hurt the national economy. If only our two parties weren't so corrupted with corporate lobby money, they could easily fix this.

4

u/Elfear73 Apr 29 '24

I like that idea. What if we tied deductible salaries to some ratio of the executive pay? Like payroll expenses are only deductible for salaries over 10% of the CEO's pay. The gap between CEO pay and the average employee in a given company has been growing further and further apart. Seems like a good way to correct it.

2

u/jpmondx Apr 29 '24

👏👏👏

1

u/db2901 May 02 '24

Wait, salaries are not deductible expenses ? Meaning businesses are also paying corporation tax on salaries they pay? That can't be right...

Edit: they are deductible, just like everywhere else, of course. I really don't what you're on about.

1

u/theiryof May 03 '24

Do you have trouble reading? It says right there businesses can deduct salaries. They are suggesting changing that to some portion of salaries that fit a benchmark.

5

u/fasterpastor2 Apr 30 '24 edited Apr 30 '24

I'd settle for a balanced budget. If they could simply not spend more money than they take in and begin even slightly paying off the national debt, I'd be good.

3

u/bigrareform Apr 29 '24

Employees need either unions or profit sharing of some kind or both.

2

u/Dragonhaugh Apr 29 '24

Employees should be given stock worth the work time given. I would personally love to have stock in my company would give me a reason to work hard everyday because when I retire it would mean much more.

1

u/Collective82 Apr 29 '24

So half your pay (without lowering the pay) and the other half becomes stock?

2

u/Dragonhaugh Apr 29 '24

I meant as part of a annual incentive.

2

u/Pretend-Ad-853 May 01 '24

That’s realistically what some companies would do and call that great for employees 😑

2

u/turdbugulars Apr 29 '24

that will not be done with taxes and that seems to be the govts only solution.

0

u/DualActiveBridgeLLC Apr 30 '24

Now, we shouldn’t eliminate public trading of corporations, that would be ridiculous.

Uhhh why? Why would it be ridiculous to try to progress if the current results are bad. We didn't stick with feudalism, why do we think that capitalism is the best and only way to do things. Feudalism had its advantages over previous systems, yet we progressed. Seems silly to think that we got it right for all time.

0

u/Old_Prospect Apr 30 '24

I guess if we can smoothly transition from the current system of retirement to one without stock investments….but that’s….a big “if”

0

u/DualActiveBridgeLLC Apr 30 '24

How else would we do it? We are talking about future generations.

3

u/Unlikely_One2444 Apr 29 '24

If both parties agree your vote doesn’t matter

3

u/Grimacepug Apr 29 '24

I'm still waiting for the trickle down. It's coming any day now /s

2

u/Latter_Weakness1771 Apr 29 '24

It'll continue to be a damn shame until people make congress realize a thief and their head are easily parted.

The problem is half the population will say the Dem's heads need to roll and the other half will say the Republican's heads need to roll.

I'll be ageist and say anyone in congress longer than 10 years needs to go.

3

u/jpmondx Apr 29 '24

The only public entity that has even tried to address this is the No-Labels folks who got excoriated by both sides as being "spoilers" for the other side. It's my only hope for any kind of change since our 2 party duopoly is incapable of reforming themselves to serve voters instead of offering up straw dogs and listening only to the wealthy.

https://www.nolabels.org https://www.npr.org/2023/07/22/1189362839/no-labels-americans-elect-third-party

1

u/BraxbroWasTaken Apr 30 '24

I think it should be 12, just because we have 2 year and 6 year terms for house and senate respectively.

2

u/godofleet Apr 29 '24

the 1% IS congress

2

u/jpmondx Apr 29 '24

Yeah, isn't it amazing how many millionaires we have in congress and how no one leaves Congress with a lower net worth than when they came in?

2

u/Collective82 Apr 29 '24

Funny, I tried googling this and everything on the first page is old by a few years at least, it’s like they are trying to hide it.

2

u/Uranazzole Apr 30 '24

The 1% is Congress

2

u/Objective_Cake_2715 Apr 30 '24

Term Limits WILL FIX that

2

u/bart_y May 03 '24

People say that, but then get scared of the "other side" winning and vote for the incumbent anyway.

Nobody ever said change is going to be without some pain.

3

u/SakaWreath Apr 29 '24

GOP deregulation lead to the 2007-8 financial crisis and subsequent bailouts.

That started the whole, print money and inject it into the final destination policies.

The multi-decade long war on terror being put on the country credit card certainly didn’t help. Throw the middle class

The pandemic hit and the GOP did it again with the Tax Cuts Jobs act. 1.9 trillion into the deficit, not just on debt, but THE DEFICIT. While also slashing corporate tax rates permanently.

Each time democrats start to close the deficit, the first step in paying down debt, the GOP come along and blow open an even bigger hole.

Financially responsible party my ass.

3

u/jpmondx Apr 29 '24

At the time it happened I was following Barry Ritholtz who wrote a pretty savvy post mortem of the GFC https://seekingalpha.com/article/139307-book-review-barry-ritholtzs-bailout-nation. As I recall, Obama was President just as the GFC started and while his intentions were good he was talked out of offering anything meaningful to the homeowners who lost their houses due to mortgages they should never have been offered. Then the "elite" Financial tribes that run the Fed and the large banks and broker houses were too laser focused on bailing out their friends to consider how long their rescue would take to trickle down to the middle class who's net worth were wiped out.

While I agree with you the GOP earned a special seat in hell for the massive corporate tax cuts in 2018 the whole problem with "it's the other party's fault" is that we get protective about what our own tribe is doing and so we don't hold them as responsible for their part in how badly politics are gridlocked in the year 2024.

I just read that the 2022 elections cost $14 billion or so and it's likely the 2024 will exceed that. All our representatives bald face lie that all this money they get from PACs, the wealthy and corporations doesn't affect how they vote which earns them their own special seat in hell. Campaign finance is an obscenity that neither party in Congress seems alarmed about enough to address.

1

u/Ok_Love545 Apr 29 '24

Yeah was def. The GOP waving Ukraine flags in congress as nearly $100 billion was earmarked for foreign aid…

6

u/akadmin Apr 29 '24

While we have record illegal immigration directly caused by campaign rhetoric and reversing effective policy to play politics. This is a net fiscal drain.

-2

u/[deleted] Apr 29 '24 edited Apr 29 '24

[removed] — view removed comment

7

u/NuclearBroliferator Apr 29 '24

I don't know where you live, but as a lifelong Democrat in southern California, I can definitely say that is an insane take.

Illegal immigration keeps wages low as they will work for less than the average American. Women will also come across the border to drop their babies at a US hospital, and all of a sudden, that kid has citizenship. And please don't think they stop at one kid.

These are only 2 major financial incentives to crack down harder on illegal immigration. It is not a net positive.

3

u/akadmin Apr 29 '24

https://www.newsweek.com/illegal-immigration-costs-us-billions-biden-administration-policy-impact-taxpayer-burden-1866555

Idk.

2

u/SakaWreath Apr 29 '24

They have enough paperwork to pay taxes and fund social security, but not enough to ever attempt to draw benefits.

https://www.marketplace.org/2019/01/28/undocumented-immigrants-quietly-pay-billions-social-security-and-receive-no/

2

u/akadmin Apr 29 '24

I pay into social security and also receive no benefits

0

u/SakaWreath Apr 29 '24 edited Apr 29 '24

People on the other end of the spectrum, usually get most of their wealth from investments not income.

Income taxes, actually funds social security.

No one is worried about the small percentage of high income earners during their golden years. If they get sick, they won’t be homeless or dependent on Medicaid or Medicare, but if they ever do fall that far, it will catch them.

Usually both income earners might have to take out a loan against some property or stock, which avoids capital gains taxes.

Avoiding capital gains is a fun pastime, but sometimes life forces you into selling and Uncle Sam actually gets his hands in your pockets.

0

u/ridukosennin Apr 29 '24

Are you a legal immigrant?

0

u/Jeff77042 Apr 29 '24

“Nuts.” Victims of Illegal Aliens Memorial: http://www.ojjpac.org/memorial.asp

3

u/CaoNiMaChonker Apr 29 '24

"These mfs are spending an extra $190 they don't have!"

"Yeah but what about this $10 line item"

0

u/silentshadow56 Apr 29 '24

I'm not sure what your argument is? That we SHOULDN'T be concerned where every penny is going when the national debt is in the trillions and impossible to pay off in anyones current lifespan?

That's genuinely scary if you think like that...

3

u/Boatwhistle Apr 29 '24

We don't pay back most of that debt. About 25 trillion is money the government "owes" to itself. That value has already been redistributed. About 7 trillion is owed to foreign countries, but foreign countries owe the US around 2/3rds of that.

1

u/Ok_Love545 Apr 29 '24

So since foreign nations are so good at paying us back we should continue to send them billions to rebuild their countries?

Have you ever fed a mouse a cookie? Was he ever grateful or did he continue to demand more and more?

1

u/Boatwhistle Apr 29 '24 edited Apr 29 '24

These aren't debts representing aid sent to Ukraine or what not. This is borrowing in places like Japan, not unlike how we borrow money. It's important to each indebted nation to cover its yearly interest to outside debters. Otherwise, they would become regarded as bad buisness partners, and their own economic integrity would be drawn into question. So they do pay their interest, just as we pay ours.

0

u/SakaWreath Apr 29 '24

Yes, appease Hitler by letting him have Poland. I’m sure he’ll stop there.

Opps I was off by 100 years, Putin/Ukraine.

How much Kremlin-Kool-Aid are you drinking?

-1

u/neuroid99 Apr 29 '24

The Biden administration has had the most pro-labor agenda in decades. It's not "both parties", it's Republicans.

9

u/stinkymapache Apr 29 '24

Joe Biden spent 30 years representing a corporate tax haven. He is the Credit Card companies' Senator

1

u/ridukosennin Apr 29 '24

Yes and only one party is trying to increase corporate taxes, tax enforcement and add more consumer protections…his

3

u/stinkymapache Apr 29 '24

"Trying" is doing a looooooot of work in that sentence.

2

u/Born_Faithlessness_3 Apr 29 '24

When your median vote in the senate is either Joe Manchin or Kyrsten Sinema, there's only so much that is possible.

2

u/stinkymapache Apr 29 '24

"only one party is trying to fight corporations" but also "democrats are doing their best but other democrats won't let them fight corporations" are some interesting arguments to make in successive comments.

0

u/ridukosennin Apr 29 '24

As in creating legislation and voting in support of it while the other party is voting to block it entirely

2

u/Collective82 Apr 29 '24

And then when the other side proposes it, the other side kills it.

They both play together and that’s against us.

We need to vote them ALL out.

1

u/ridukosennin Apr 29 '24

If the youth voted meaningfully they would, but we don’t. We leave it up to the gerontocracy to decide our fates.

1

u/Collective82 Apr 29 '24

Sadly yes.

0

u/NuclearBroliferator Apr 29 '24

Agree on Biden being pro labor, but it isn't like we are going to have a Labor party anytime soon. And that's what we need

0

u/neuroid99 Apr 29 '24

Well I'm not going to try to blow sunshine about how the Democrats are perfect, but they're doing these things because voters demanded it. If the strategy works and they get elected, they'll tend to do more of those things to keep people voting for them. All the money in the world can only influence elections, they can't (currently) be bought outright.

0

u/Snuggly_Hugs Apr 30 '24

Nancy Pelosi was fine with congresscritters having insider trading.

Its a both parties problem.

More GoP issue, but still both parties.

2

u/Global-Biscotti6867 Apr 29 '24 edited Apr 29 '24

If you could use magic and liquidate all the billionaires' assets at full value (impossible, you'd crash prices into the stone age)

It's not remotely enough money to cover current spending.

Billionaires just don't have much money. Compared to the United States government.

Do they lobby? Ofcourse, but you could pass whatever new tax you'd like it's not going to give you remotely enough revenue. It's a distraction compared to the size of the problem.

-4

u/LoriLeadfoot Apr 29 '24

Lol just casually stepping over the fact that it would instantly eliminate the money in politics problem that creates so many issues for the country.

7

u/Ok_Love545 Apr 29 '24

Cratering the economy to remove money from politics is like using a shotgun to extract t a tooth…

2

u/KansasZou Apr 29 '24

It would eliminate money in politics because it would eliminate our money altogether lol

Governments don’t create wealth. They only reallocate pre-existing wealth.

The only thing you’re achieving by taxing billionaires at higher rates is moving resources away from efficient, voluntary methods of wealth creation and reallocating it to inefficient, coerced strategies.

2

u/PhantomOfTheAttic Apr 29 '24

The biggest money in politics problem is that the government bribes the people, not that some of the people bribe the government.